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Industrial Biotechnology contains more than just biofuels.Already today, 13% of used resources for the entire Germanchemical industry are bio-based, emphasized Dr JochemHenkelmann from BASF, at the energy-colloquium ofDECHEMA, the German Society for Chemical Engineeringand Biotechnology, in January 2012. And this percentagewill increase. Renewable substitutes for carbon need to bedeveloped, established and marketed before the oil runsout. Demand for biofuels and carbon compounds for chemi-cal synthesis will rise even further as new middle classesdevelop in the emerging markets. Bio-based buildingblocks are base chemicals made from renewable feed-stock. This article will highlight some of the latest develop-ments in the building block market.

Drivers for biobased building blocksThe drivers for the development of bio-based buildingblocks are of both economical and political nature. Thefinite oil reserves and the rising oil prices create a needfor new renewable resources within and beyond the chemical industry. The price for oil relies on decisionsmade by a few producers and traders, creating a volatileprice structure. Renewable resources create new supplypossibilities, offering the chemical industry an alterna -tive resource base. This drive to “go green” is backed bya political agenda; spelt out in mandates such as the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) and Europe’s BioethanolSubsidies.

State of the artThe production of ethanol, lactic acid, PDO (see table forabbreviations) and succinic acid already takes place oncommercial levels. Known as a biofuel, bioethanol is in

fact also a building block. Brasilian Braskem markets biopolyethylen based on bioethanol. Lactic acid is usedto produce PLA for biodegradable packaging. Nova Insti-tute expects volumes to rise to about 1 million tons by

Bioeconomy beyond biofuels

A review of bio-based building blocks for the chemical industry

By Dr Jörg Riesmeier, CEO, Direvo Industrial Biotechnology GmbH

Dr Jörg Riesmeier

Direvo Industrial Biotechnology GmbH

The German Direvo Industrial Biotechnology GmbHdeveloped a biotechnology platform called BluCon®

based on heat-tolerant bacteria able to create valueadded products from a broad variety of non-food biomass feedstock in a one-step-process. Another ofDirevo’s technologies is BluZy® which increases nutrition quality and digestibility of dried distillersgrains and solubles (DDGS) for animal feed. PBT, a plastic similar to PET

2020. Bio-PDO (DuPont) is usedto create PTT, a technical plas -tic similar to PET, used for du -rable plastic-containers. Succi-nic acid is the new star: in 2013,biotechno logical production isexpected to exceed petrol based production. At least fourproduction plants with 10.000-15.000 tons per year capacityare planned to start production.The BASF/Purac and theDSM/Roquette cooperationseach plan to bring online a plantwith about 10.000 tons of annualproduction capacity in Europe, while in North America BioAm-ber plans to open a 17.000 t plantin Canada and Myriant is buildinga 13.000 t plant in the US. Succinicacid is a precursor to BDO, which is used to create thespandex fiber, PBT (another plastic similar to PET) andPBS, a new all green plastic. Amyris’ farnesene, supposed

to substitute petrol based jet fuels and diesel, could prove a precursor to many fragrances and pharmaceu -ticals which can’t be produced by chemical synthesis.

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Building Block

Biotechnological Production Scale

Yearly Production Markets

Ethanol Commercial 85 billion liters (biobased)

FuelsSolventsPolyethylene

Lactic Acid Commercial 400,000 tons (biobased)

Polylacticacid (PLA)Food Additive

1,3-Propanediol (PDO)

Commercial 50,000 tons (biobased)

Polytrimethylene Terephthalate (PTT)PolyurethaneCosmetic & Personal CareHome Cleaning

Succinic Acid Commercial 50,000 tons (biobased in 2013)20,000 tons (petrol based)

1,4-ButanediolPharmaceuticalsPolymersFibersFood Additive

Farnesene Commercial n.a. Jet FuelDieselFragrancePharmaceuticalsReplacement of Isoprene

Table 1: Overview of Bio-based building blocks, production volumes and associated markets

Source: Public data summarized by Direvo Industrial Biotechnology GmbH

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Current barriersPrice and technology are the two main barriers for bio-based building blocks. Advances in the latter lead to advances in the first. Cost competitiveness with petrol based chemicals is a must, there is no extra for green.Current feedstocks are cane or corn sugar. Corn especial-ly has reached historic price levels putting biotechnolo-gy companies under pressure and intensifying the fuelvs. food debate. The production processes of bio-basedbuilding blocks are similar to bioethanol, where feed-stock price is the main cost driver, accounting for twothirds of the price.

Current solutionsSugar from cellulose is three to five times cheaper thansugar from starch. Much research has been carried outon how to efficiently turn cellulose into fermentable su-gars and lignin. And now is the time to harvest. In 2012,Beta Renewables first-of-a-kind full scale 20 million gallon cellulosic ethanol biorefinery went online. This allowsfor some number crunching: Beta Renewables cost allocation is around 40 to 60% biomass cost, 25 to 40%enzyme cost, 10 to 15% operating costs (personnel, electricity, etc.) and ~3% yeast costs to produce theraw ethanol. In first generation biofuels feedstock

accounted for two thirds of the production costs. This share dropsto around half for second genera -tion fuels, with enzymes creating athird of the cost. Enzyme costs aretherefore a new means to controlproduct costs. Beta Renewables areusing a three-step-process with se-parate enzyme production, cellulo-se to sugar diges tion and sugar toproduct conversion. This allows foreach of these steps to happen under different reaction conditionsand therefore require a less com-plex microbe-design. The tradeoff ishigher costs, as three different reactions are necessary to reachthe desired product.

New developmentsAdvances in microbiological and genetic knowledge of heat-tolerantmicrobes open a path to a more sophisticated, cheaper one-step- process. In one-step-processes, cellulose is directly converted tobuilding blocks. The enzymes neces-sary for cellulose digestion are produced in the reactor by the verysame microbes that ferment the resulting sugars. Therefore, sepa -rated production of enzymes is no

Fig. 1: Design of a consolidated one-step-process for cellulose to ethanol conversion

Source: Direvo Industrial Biotechnology GmbH

Conclusion

The transition to a bio-based economy is already takingplace today. The change is supported by political andeconomic pressure. Several established building blockshave already been produced on an industrial scale andthey are used especially for polymer production. Newtechnologies help to reach price parity with petrol based chemicals. To avoid food vs. plastics debates,non-food-biomass has to be made accessible as a resource. The first industrial size cellulosic-ethanolplant went online in late 2012, a milestone in the de -velopment of cellulose-based biofuels. New develop-ments in the microbiology and the genetic engineeringof heat-tolerant microbes further reduce the costs forthe biotechnological production of chemicals.

Special “Industrial Biotechnology 2013” 21

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longer necessary, reducing the costs for enzymes to zero. Although it’s a promising business, the number ofEuropean companies dedicated to the development of aone-step-process is still low. Besides to a few other Euro-pean companies, Direvo is the only German company topossess such a consolidated process for the direct con-version of cellulose to value added products.

Sugar from cellulose is three to five times cheaper than sugar from starch.Photo: D-Kuru/Wikimedia Commons

Photos: PantherMedia / Kurhan